Comments

There has been no real – nor proper investigation into the tragic events of last year. Ninety-one dead and more than two thousand injured. The courts – the police – the military – the government and its attendant ministries diligently and dutifully continue to obfuscate and hamper any real investigation.

And why? Because the vast majority of these fatalities and injuries were the direct result of the army firing indiscriminately – without any feelings of compunction or guilt – onto ordinary and unarmed anti-government protesters.

To date – not one single individual currently serving in the military – or government for that matter – has been brought to justice for their murderous – unlawful – and illegal actions.

Nor will any such individual ever be brought to justice any time soon – at least under this government – such is the nature of the staus quo that currently exists.

A good example of the lengths to which this current government will attempt to maintain its strangle hold over true democracy and justice is the announcement that the Interior Ministry is speeding up the selection of ninety-five district chiefs before the election which will help The Bhum Jai Thai Party at the polls.

And as The Bangkok Post points out:”These chiefs or Nai Amphur are critical at election time as they become the Election Commission’s district election directors overseeing the elections.”

Talk about bending over backwards to ensure that The Bhum Jai Thai Party in the next election has a huge and unfair advantage aimed at ensuring this shameless Democrat led coalition continues to dominate – at all costs – at the expense of all challengers – namely The Pheu Thai party.

Your crowd photo is blurry and is made up of 3 different photos! They do not show us an attendence as you claim! Propaganda at work on this side! Very dangerous.

Nothing like exploiting the dead for a movement still clearly run top to bottom by cleptocratic billionaire Thaksin Shinwatra and his cadre of foreign backers and local gangsters.

Then again, that was the entire point of bringing in mercenaries on April 10, 2010 and ensuring a bloodbath took place. It’s much better to have actual bodies to exploit than made-up stories like after 2009.

To answer Nick’s question as to why the media didn’t give it major coverage – they probably don’t see the merit in giving publicity to the crass exploitation of naive and impressionable people that should be learning trade skills instead of the tenants of social progress according to Peua Thai, and the crooked police colonel turned crooked billionaire Thaksin Shinwatra – who by the way, as Nick observed, is still the centerpiece of the UDD movement.

Will the esteemed Ambassador/Lawyer endorse the second, third, and forth sentences of the Declaration of Independence (1776)?

c34

“If this does happen, then the military will be duty bound to intervene for the sake of the country. Thaksin and his Chinese cronies cannot be allowed to rape the country again.”

Tempting to observe that the second sentence suggests an indifference to someone else and their Chinese cronies raping the country – but, personally, I’m not that keen to focus on racial differentiation like this. Whatever Chinese-Thai may be guilty of, “ethnic” Thai have not been noticeably slow in trying to emulate.

The first sentence implies an honourable “duty” and a clear practical benefit to the country. Past examples, of course, demonstrate exactly the opposite – the motive has been invariably self-serving and of benefit to just a narrow clique and not to the country (and thus its people) as a whole.

Defending a military response to “a win by Pui Thai” (i.e. using force to reverse the election result) is akin to defending a standard mafia protection racket. So is using the threat of that military response as grounds to vote in a Democrat government that, based on previous form, is highly unlikely to gain a plurality let alone a majority otherwise.

Put simply, you do not get to “see Democracy in Thailand” by installing a one-party government at the point of a gun. They could not “govern with a solid majority in their own right” – precisely because they did not achieve that solid majority “in their own right”. Various forms of Democracy have varying blends of factors to justify the label, but all of them include a decision freely reached by a plurality/majority of the electorate – not one dictated by an armed minority from its barracks.

Finally, past experience of Thai governments not dependent on minority party support has not shown a decrease in corruption – let alone an absence of it. Most of them have been military regimes and one (TRT) has been civilian. Needless to say, both types have been markedly corrupt – the many military examples in particular. Nor is there anything in the Democrat’s track record to suggest that they would or even could be any exception to the rule. Quite why Soonuk Dum imagines otherwise is baffling. Does the “Democrat” label somehow confer instant purity on those that sport it? Doesn’t seem to apply to Suthep – just one example of many Democrats whose hands are anything but clean.

Plainly enough, fewer lucrative ministries doled out to minority parties as payment for their support means more goodies for the majority party. No change in practices – just in who the beneficiaries are.

I concur what a really well written article, thanks for writing this!

#34 But that’s precisely where we part ways. I have ALWAYS seen the Thai military as a major part of the corruption. Indeed, when hasn’t this country been racked by RTA/RTP economic rivalry? I also have NO confidence in the Democrats, as they seem 100% intent on driving people towards Thaksin.

to Luecha Na Malai, how dare you say that you are “sorry to say that many of my compatriots do not really practice Buddhism. Instead, they choose to behave like crooks”! What about the muslims, the animists, the christians, the atheists, are they crooks for not practicing Buddhism. I’m sorry, but the expectation that people must behave in a particular way or be labled crooks is at the very heart of the problem. Cutural uniformity is not the answer, rather tolerant diversity is. People should behave as citizens, with or without religion.

tukkae – 2

The question is not about the price but rather the “necessity” of needing to have one at all. The Dutch navy is the “all frigate” (meaning they dont have anything else but frigate class ship) and they dont seem to be complaining about their navy being “out of date”. Ain’t the money be more suitable for something else more urgent more productive…. you know, like rebuild the south from the flooding disaster, developing 3G (or even 4G!) network, high speed trade, new transportation network… you know, some thing that will actually add value to the country??

Even “IF” Thailand really need a submarine fleet, we opt for a 40 years old design, with some improve equipment, but Vietnam has opt for the Kilo-class submarine, a relatively newer design and is to be construct from ground up with most modern equipment.

Oh and let me remind you that we are talking about a military equipment here, its suppose to be working in good order for the next 20-30 years due to the cost of acquire this military material is very expensive. It is certainly not by any mean, a 2nd hand car, where you can just buy and replace in 3 years.

On the site note, the Royal Navy do have some problem with handling the submarine. However, the ASW tactic deploy by the Royal Navy duly took out the ARA Santa Fe during the early day of the war. The Royal Navy actually have more problem with the Super Etendard armed with the Exocet anti-ship missile.

Mike W. – 5

“For certain a crowd of 80,000 would have impacted Udon traffic, because that is more people than the entire population of Udon Thani…”

Wow, surprise to see who claimed to be from “Udon Thani” to not even know the population of the province itself, well check this out

http://www.statoids.com/uth.html

Udon Thani TH.UN 41 TH76 NE 1,467,158

Well, Udon got about 1.5 million population, having 80,000 people gathered is about 0.53% of the total population, certainly its possible to have a mass of 80,000 from the province alone.

[In fact it’s 5.45%. AW]